Ellis County, TX

County Profile

213,160 residents. Safety, jobs, income, housing cost, climate and natural-hazard risk for Ellis County, TX.

Several figures AreaProfile publishes are measured by county and nowhere finer — death rates by intent among them. On this page those describe the geography they are printed on, which is not true of the city and ZIP pages that inherit them.

77out of 100
Area Score
Top 6% of 1,225 profiles measured

How we calculate this

How this area ranks
OpportunityTop 27% of 1,255 counties measured67
SchoolsTop 34% of 973 counties measured64
GrowthTop 5% of 1,226 counties measured78
Housing affordability669th of 1,255 counties measured92
Climate639th of 1,254 counties measured68
Physical resilienceTop 11% of 1,255 counties measured88
AccessTop 45% of 1,255 counties measured84
Economic stabilityTop 5% of 1,255 counties measured94
The quick read

Unemployment is 4.6% and median household income $99,595, putting employment conditions in the middle range of published profiles.

In the public schools here, 47% of students met the state standard in mathematics, with 15.6 students for every teacher.

Natural-hazard exposure is lower than in most comparable published profiles, placing Ellis County in the top 11% for physical resilience.

At a glance

Population
213,160
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median household income
$99,595
Top 5% nationally
Density
228/sq mi
935.8 sq mi of land
Median age
36.3
2024 ACS 5-Year
County
Ellis County
Texas
Metro area
Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX
Nearest major airport
DAL
35 mi · Dallas Love Fld
Median home value
$348,600
2024 ACS 5-Year

Jobs & opportunity

Unemployment of 4.6% is lower than 34% of the 1,255 measured US locations.

Employment fell 0.3% over the past year, to 120,105 employed residents.

30% of adults hold a four-year degree, higher than 76% of measured US locations.

Household income is higher than at least 95% of measured US locations.

MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Median household income ±$3,164$99,595Top 5%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Per capita income ±$1,274$40,925Top 23%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Poverty rate6.9%Bottom 6%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Average commute32.9 minTop 12%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Bachelor's degree or higher30.1%Top 24%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Employment120,105Top 22%of 1,255June 2026
Employment change (3 years)5.5%Top 7%of 1,255June 2026
Employment change (year over year)-0.3%Top 39%of 1,255June 2026
Labor force125,926Top 22%of 1,255June 2026
Labor force participation68.2%Top 7%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Unemployment change (year over year)0.7%Top 18%of 1,255June 2026
Unemployment rate4.6%Top 34%of 1,255June 2026
Unemployment rate
2021/062022/032022/122023/092024/062025/032025/102026/065.03.2
Monthly unemployment rate from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, most recent value 4.6% in June 2026. A break in the line is a month the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not publish for this area — it is left empty rather than estimated.
Median household income, successive ACS releases
2021202220232024100k85k
Each point is a separate five-year estimate, most recently $99,595 in the 2024 ACS 5-Year. Consecutive releases share four years of sample, so AreaProfile shows them as a record of successive estimates and does not compute a year-over-year change from them.
Largest occupations — Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX
OccupationPeople employedMedian annual wage
Fast Food and Counter Workers128,380$28,070
General and Operations Managers125,090$111,010
Stockers and Order Fillers111,100$37,590
Retail Salespersons100,340$33,400
Customer Service Representatives96,930$44,990
Laborers and Freight, Stock, and Material Movers, Hand81,940$38,510

Occupational employment and wages are published for metropolitan areas rather than for individual cities or ZIP areas, so these describe the wider labor market this location sits in. 2025 OEWS, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

47% of students met the state standard in mathematics and 44% in reading, across the schools here that reported results.

There are 15.6 students for every full-time teacher, more than in most measured places.

Public schools
75
2024-25 school year
Students per teacher
15.6
across all schools here
Math proficiency
47.1%
Top 26% in Texas
Reading proficiency
43.9%
Top 35% in Texas
SchoolDistrictStudentsPer teacherMathReading
WAXAHACHIE H SWAXAHACHIE ISD3,05615.8
RED OAK H SRED OAK ISD2,29716.5
MIDLOTHIAN H SMIDLOTHIAN ISD1,97617.2
ENNIS H SENNIS ISD1,88715.5
MIDLOTHIAN HERITAGE H SMIDLOTHIAN ISD1,76019.8
RED OAK MIDDLERED OAK ISD1,48817.355%38%
LIFE H S WAXAHACHIE · charterLIFE SCHOOL1,11418.0
LIFE SCHOOL RED OAK · charterLIFE SCHOOL1,04523.235%37%
WALNUT GROVE MIDDLEMIDLOTHIAN ISD1,01219.873%65%
EARL & MARTHALU DIETERICH MIDDLEMIDLOTHIAN ISD98919.065%52%
FERRIS H SFERRIS ISD94012.5
HOWARD J HWAXAHACHIE ISD91816.762%52%

50.6% of students here are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. That describes the circumstances families arrive with rather than how the schools perform, which is why AreaProfile shows it and does not score it.

Public schools only, from the NCES Common Core of Data. Schools are placed by ZIP code, so this is which schools are in this place rather than which one a particular address is zoned for — district boundaries do not follow municipal ones, and enrollment zones change. Fully virtual schools are excluded: they enroll students from across the state while reporting one administrative address, and counting them here would describe a school population this place does not have. The assessment covers grades 3 through 8, so a high school shows no proficiency figure — a dash in those columns means the test was not given at that school, not that it performed badly. Proficiency is measured against Texas’s own standard, so it compares cleanly within the state and only broadly against other states; AreaProfile therefore ranks it within state. The directory is current, while the proficiency figures are from the last school year with national coverage before the pandemic interrupted testing.

Housing & affordability

How it’s calculated →

Median rent of $1,594 takes 19% of median household income, below the 30% threshold at which a household is considered cost-burdened.

A median home costs 3.5 times median household income here, above the historic benchmark of about three times income.

Rent as a share of income
19.2%
Below the 30% cost-burdened threshold
Home price to income
3.5×
median home value ÷ median income
Median gross rent
$1,594
2024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value
$348,600
2024 ACS 5-Year
MetricValueCompared nationallySource period
Home price to income3.50Top 31%of 3,2192024 ACS 5-Year
Homeownership rate75.8%Top 44%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Housing units ±21875,422Top 12%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year
Median gross rent ±$53$1,594Top 6%of 3,2162024 ACS 5-Year
Median home value ±$5,457$348,600Top 13%of 3,2192024 ACS 5-Year
Rent as a share of income19.2%Top 27%of 3,2162024 ACS 5-Year
Vacancy rate4.9%Bottom 5%of 3,2222024 ACS 5-Year

Both affordability measures come from the same ACS release as the income they are compared with, so the comparison is like for like. They describe housing cost against local earnings and are not a cost-of-living index — transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes are not included, and a place can look affordable here and still be expensive to live in for reasons this does not capture.

Growth & development

How it’s calculated →
Development Momentum
78/ 100
Top 5% of 1,226 published city profiles
Permitting is increasing — 2 consecutive years, measured from 2020 to 2025.

An AreaProfile calculation combining permit volume per resident, its direction over one and three years, population change and employment growth. Permit volume alone is not the measure.

Population has grown 20% since 2020, reaching 232,387 in 2024.

Population is still rising, but more slowly than in the preceding year.

New construction is predominantly single-family: only 11% of permitted units are in buildings of five or more homes.

At 14.2 permitted units per 1,000 residents, building activity is above the median for measured US locations.

Units permitted
3,035
12 months ending July 2026
Per 1,000 residents
14.2
Top 2% nationally
Year over year
−10%
vs the prior twelve months
Multifamily share
11.2%
units in 5+ unit buildings
Population, annual estimates
20202021202220232024232k194k
Census Population Estimates Program, July 1 of each year. These annual estimates are designed for year-over-year comparison, unlike the ACS five-year figure shown as this profile's population.
Housing units permitted per year
2020202120222023202420254k3k
Annual totals from the Census Building Permits Survey. Permitting in 2025 was higher than 2020 (+25%).

Weather & climate

6 of the twelve months have a normal average temperature between 55°F and 80°F. July averages a high of 96°F and January a low of 38°F.

Normal annual precipitation is 37.7 inches.

Air quality measures a median index of 36, in the Good band, and one day a year passes 100, the threshold at which the air is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

30°50°70°90°110°JFMAMJJASOND
Solid line: normal daily high. Dashed line: normal daily low. 1991-2020 normals from NOAA station DALLAS REDBIRD AP, 23.4 miles from this location.
Precipitation
JFMAMJJASOND4.5"
Normal monthly precipitation, in inches.
MetricValueSource period
90th percentile air quality index51.02024 calendar year
Annual precipitation37.7"1991-2020 Normals
Average January low38°F1991-2020 Normals
Average July high96°F1991-2020 Normals
Comfortable months61991-2020 Normals
Days above AQI 10012024 calendar year
Median air quality index36.02024 calendar year
Seasonal temperature swing38°F1991-2020 Normals
Air quality
Median air quality index
36
Good on a typical day
Worst tenth of days
51
90th percentile index
Days above 100
1
unhealthy for sensitive groups

A comfortable median and a bad tail are different problems. Wildfire smoke and summer ozone show up in the worst tenth of days, not in the middle of the year.

Climate figures are thirty-year normals, not current conditions. They describe what a typical year looks like rather than what the weather is doing today. Air quality is measured rather than modelled, by EPA monitors, and published by county only where a monitor sits — roughly half the counties AreaProfile publishes have one, and the rest show nothing rather than an estimate. Air masses are regional, so a county reading describes the air over a place reasonably well, but it is still the county reading.

Physical risk

88 / 100
Physical resilience

The hazards accounting for most of this area's expected annual loss are tornado, hail and lightning.

HailElevated
TornadoModerate
LightningModerate
WildfireModerate
Winter weatherModerate

Low or minimal exposure: heat wave, cold wave, inland flooding, ice storm, hurricane, earthquake, strong wind, drought, landslide.

Hazard ratings are AreaProfile calculations derived from the FEMA National Risk Index v1.20.0 (December 2025). FEMA National Risk Index county record. FEMA does not endorse this presentation. Higher physical resilience means lower exposure.

These are deaths, not offences. AreaProfile does not publish reported crime, and this is not a substitute for it — it says nothing about burglary, theft or assault.

Ellis County records 4.2 homicide deaths per 100,000 residents a year, near the middle of counties measured. The CDC does not publish this below county level.

Firearm deaths of all intents run at 10.8 per 100,000 — more than the homicide rate, because nationally most firearm deaths are suicides.

Drug overdose deaths run at 6.7 per 100,000 residents in Ellis County.

Homicide
4.2
per 100,000 residents · under 10 deaths
Firearm deaths, all intents
10.8
per 100,000 residents
Drug overdose
6.7
per 100,000 residents
Suicide
10.3
per 100,000 residents

Firearm deaths count every intent together, and nationally the majority are suicides rather than homicides. The two columns overlap and should not be added.

Age-adjusted rates from provisional death certificate records, published by the CDC for Ellis County as a whole — these rates are not published below county level. A county can hold both a dense city centre and a suburb whose experience of it is nothing alike, so this describes the county around Ellis County rather than Ellis County itself. That is why AreaProfile shows these figures and does not put them in the Area Score. Where fewer than ten deaths were recorded the count is suppressed at source, and a rate built on single figures moves sharply between releases. What this measure has that reported crime does not: a death certificate is filed whether or not the local police agency submitted a return that year, so the figures stay comparable between places and over time.

What this profile does not cover

Three things people look for are missing from every AreaProfile page, and each is missing for a reason rather than by oversight. The Area Score is calculated without them and the weighting is documented on the methodology page.

Reported crime
Offences reported to police are published by department rather than by town, and only where a department reported every month of the year. No municipal department reports for this place — many smaller communities are policed by the county — so there is no figure to show. A partial year is never scaled up to look complete, and arrest counts or news volume are never substituted for it.
Taxes and full cost of living
No public source publishes either with national coverage and a method open enough to check. Housing affordability above is computed from published rent, price and income, and excludes transport, groceries, healthcare, insurance and taxes — commuting cost in particular tends to offset suburban housing savings. Nothing here is individualised tax advice.
Anything about a specific address
Every figure describes an area, not a street or a house. School attendance zones, insurance pricing and the character of a neighbourhood all vary within the places measured here.

Access

6 major airports lie within 100 miles, the nearest 35 miles away.

AirportCodeDistanceLongest runway
Dallas Love FldDAL35 mi8,800 ft
Dallas-Fort Worth IntlDFW41 mi13,401 ft
Tstc WacoCNW52 mi8,600 ft

Airport identity, position and runway data come from the FAA. “Major airport” is an AreaProfile classification — a public-use civil airport with a paved runway of at least 8,000 feet — not an FAA hub designation. Distances are straight-line, not driving distance.

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Area Score
77
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Data & methodology

Used forSourceSource periodUpdated
AccessFederal Aviation Administration
Airports (NASR) — Aeronautical Data Delivery Service
NASR current cycle28-day NASR cycle
Physical riskFederal Emergency Management Agency
National Risk Index
National Risk Index December 2025 (v1.20.0)Periodic dataset versions (v1.20.0 current)
ClimateNOAA National Centers for Environmental Information
U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020 (Monthly)
1991-2020 NormalsEvery ten years (next release follows the 2001–2030 period)
JobsU.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Local Area Unemployment Statistics
June 2026Monthly
DemographicsU.S. Census Bureau
Population Estimates Program
July 1, 2024 estimateAnnual (vintage released each spring)
DevelopmentU.S. Census Bureau
Building Permits Survey
12 months ending July 2026Monthly, roughly three weeks after the reference month
Demographics, Housing, Income, JobsU.S. Census Bureau
American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates (Table-Based Summary File)
2024 ACS 5-YearAnnual (5-year estimates released each December)
safetyU.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics
Provisional county-level mortality by intent
April, 2025 to March, 2026Quarterly, with a rolling twelve-month window alongside complete calendar years
schoolsU.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics
Common Core of Data and EDFacts assessments
2019-20 school year; 2024-25 school yearDirectory annually; assessment results as EDFacts releases them
ClimateU.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Air Quality System
Daily Air Quality Index by county
2024 calendar yearAnnually, once a calendar year is complete

Profile recalculated August 30, 2026. Recalculation is not the same as new source data — each figure above shows the period its source actually covers. Read the full methodology or browse every source.